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harry potter - Why didn't Voldemort go after Professor Trelawney?


Throughout Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort was obsessed with hearing the prophecy, but after the battle at the Ministry he still hadn’t heard it.


Via Snape, he knew that it was Professor Trelawney who originally made the prophecy.


Until Half-Blood Prince, it’s understandable why Voldemort couldn’t get to her: she was in Hogwarts with Dumbledore, and he probably protected her as much as he did Harry. We also learn from Dumbledore that she would be in danger if she left Hogwarts:



“Divination is turning out to be much more trouble than I could have foreseen, never having studied the subject myself. I cannot ask Firenze to return to the forest, where he is now an outcast, nor can I ask Sybill Trelawney to leave. Between ourselves, she has no idea of the danger she would be in outside the castle. She does not know – and I think it would be unwise to enlighten her — that she made the prophecy about you and Voldemort, you see.”



But during Deathly Hallows, when Voldemort controls the school (and most of the country), why didn’t he try to contact Trelawney, and to make her tell him what the prophecy was? She casually joins the fight during the last battle, so I think she was still teaching there and hadn’t gone into hiding.


In the beginning of Deathly Hallows, we see that Voldemort has kidnapped the Muggle-Studies Professor, before he’d even installed Snape or the Carrows. Why didn’t he try to reach Trelawney?



Answer




The only Fridge Logic reason I could come up with is that there is no magic that can be used on Trelawney to make her remember any prophesy she has made. She is just a medium for the prophesy and cannot remember any part of it, nor of even having made one.


This raises the question then of "how does the department of ministry preserve prophesies?" To which Fridge Logic leads us to the ministry using magic on the witnesses or on the area where a prophesy is given, allowing them to record it.


That leads to this question: If the ministry can record the prophesy through some magic process, then why doesn't Voldemort do the same? I think the ministry's technique scrubs or gathers up all the bits that can be used to recreate/record the prophesy (except for witnesses memories, as demonstrated by Dumbledore using his pensive to show Harry what he remembered of the prophesy), leaving nothing behind.


Maybe one day there will be an official explanation, but until then, I'll have to go with the basic Fridge Logic.


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